A blog with established readers has reputation - and a start to re indexing.

If your blog has readers who link their blog to yours, your blog gets indexed by the search engines, indirectly. As a readers blogs is indexed, and a link to your blog is found, the link to your blog is followed. Readers blogs that point to the BlogSpot URL, again using the "301 Moved Permanently" redirect, will similarly contribute to reputation for the domain URL.

You'll find the diagnostic utilities in Google Webmaster Tools to be essential, in helping you objectively observe and correct any problems.

As search engines index your blog, they adjust their indexing to follow the rate that you publish. If you publish weekly, they will, at most, re index your blog weekly. The less often you publish, the less often the blog gets re indexed.

While re indexing of the blog is in progress, you'll have some posts indexed under the BlogSpot URL, and other posts indexed under the domain URL.

As additional posts are indexed under the domain URL, those same posts will drop from indexing under the BlogSpot URL. If this were not so, you'd end up with "duplicate content" penalties. The purpose of the "301 Moved Permanently" redirect is to avoid this duplication, and penalties.

With the indexing of the blog split between the two base URLs, the reputation overall will be lower. You get better reputation with all content indexed under one base URL - and this won't be the case until the migration is complete.

With lower reputation, your posts will have poorer SERP position - some posts indexed under the old BlogSpot URL, others under the new domain URL - though all SERP entries will get your readers to the new domain.

Beware gratuitous scripts, which interfere with BlogSpot to domain redirection!

If your blog has gratuitous scripted redirection, installed to block country local domain redirection, you'll want to remove this code. Country local domain redirection blocking, followed by BlogSpot to domain redirection, will leave some readers (only some, not all) seeing

Too many redirections!

or similar advice, in their browser. Other readers may simply see the blog as offline, because of its new URL.

The transition period, and loss of reputation and traffic, can't be avoided.

You cannot avoid the new domain transition period, and reduced traffic level - you will have to endure it. In the end, if you manage the migration properly, you'll find that it was worth it.

With a new, properly setup non BlogSpot URL, more blog content, and the same reader population (forwarded from the BlogSpot URL), search engine reputation (and Page Rank) will pick up and should continue rising, beyond where it was before you started the migration.

Comments

Once again thank you for responding to my anxieties on Blogger Help Forum.

I recognize that Search Engines gather URL information from Sidecar Bloglists and embedded links specific to individual posts which contributes to indexing. I still, however, do not grasp how this factors in to embedded search on a homepage; in short, why is it that a specific search would yield (internal) results prior to a migration, but fail to function on an even rudimentary basis after the process ?

Is there any manual step which might be made to point the engine to - and incrementally register - previously published and seemingly 'lost' content ? Or is the process entirely outwith administrator control ?

Like many bloggers, my interest is primarily in the published content; its accessibility to readers. My archives are still accessible on the sidecar, albeit by chronological 'trawling' only.

I still cannot quite fathom while the embedded search yields no results, while a Google search from an an external browser continues to return post specific material.

What is in the sidebar is just like what's in the posts - links and text - nothing special. Even though it's not special, it is different.

Let's say that there are 100 posts in the blog.1. What's in each post is in 1 post each, and is different in each post.2. What's in the sidebar is published, with each of the 100 posts, as part of the page containing each post. So what's in the sidebar is 100 times more common, and will be indexed more rapidly.

Chuck,Need your advice,During domain migration from blogspot to custom domain, should i continue to post or wait until the migration completed? I'm planning to migrate my blogspot domain which is currently have 1.7k total post and 30k uv daily. I know there will be a drop of traffic but is this needed to migrate to custom domain?

I know there will be a drop of traffic but is this needed to migrate to custom domain?

You're starting a new URL, which has no reputation, a page rank of 0.0000, and no residual traffic. With the reputation in the old BlogSpot URL, and resulting traffic directed to the new URL, the reputation for the new URL will build up faster than with a new blog that is completely unknown. But you will see a drop in traffic - and yes, this is needed.

The more that you post during migration, the faster the blog will recover. Post heavier.

Hello Mr.Chuck, thanks so much of the thread: http://www.google.com/support/forum/p/blogger/thread?tid=32b398c065f0565c&hl=en&fid=32b398c065f0565c0004896ae0820430 And I got to read your site. There's so much of things here that I really want to know. I am in the same situation too, I just migrated to my a new cutom domain from blogspot.com domain. Man, this means I should be patient in getting back my traffic that I had before. I'm so lack in patience, huhuhu :) I shall book mark this page.

hi ib, i have recently made the switch to a .com from a blogger, waited the 3 days, got the in transition message, and now that the 3 days are over, i am now getting a 404 not found error message. what do i do now? also do you have tips or a step by step tips of things to do once the .com website is working? obviously i need all blogs that have my site on their blog list to update? but are there any other tips? ThanksHe

I have shifted my Blogger blog (blogs-earning.blogspot.com) to custom domain www.etipslibrary.com. Do i have to submit my site (www.etipslibrary.com) to Webmaster tools ? because currently i didnt submit my new custom domain sitemap but my new custom domain is being indexed by Google.

Hello. I purchased my custom domain today (1/21/2011) through blogger, but I did not receive the "in transition" advice. Should I wait a day or two to see if the message will appear? As of now, when I click 'view blog,' it takes me right to my ".blogspot.com" blog. It does not give the "in transition" notice. I have checked numerous times to be sure my custom domain was purchased, and it was. I have the order #. Please help. Thank you.

Hi nitecruzr, you've become my favorite guy in the last couple of days. I have a question that might seem stupid.

Yesterday I registered a custom domain name for my blog http://google-n-i-share-a-birthday.blogspot.com. My new domain name is http://www.vidyasury.com. I got this via the easy-peasy wizard in Blogger. It seems thats all there is to it after I've paid the $10. So I also created a custom email under the new domain. Then I thought I'd get an information overload on the forums.

My burning question is this: Will I continue to own http://google-n-i-share-a-birthday.blogspot.com ? Or will it become available for someone else to register? I want to keep it. So what do I do?

I had a very reputed blog www.currentvacancy.blogspot.com since 2007 in lat april 11 i changed my blogspot to custom domain www.naukriblog.com after changin i got allmost doubled traffic for 2-3 days but after that my traffic gradually started to decrease and after a week i lost my all traffics and search reputations, only i am getting my feed traffics, when i submitted for reconsideration to google i got reply that some or more pages of my site is violating google webmst guidlines, then i have deleted my all the pages and post some news pages and submitted for reconsideration but got the same anwered, now what to do, my site is getting indexed but not getting search reputation some posts are indexed some are not, i am confused please help me to sort out my problem please thanks your sir

Hai Chuck really amazing Article...But i am suffering with another strange problem...my blog follower are not immediately getting my posts updats to their blog dashboard...i used to post 40posts per day...my bloh domain is www.swarooptheking.netplease help me from this problem...Thanks in advance :-)

hello chuck actually i am not understanding the posts matter that old post url or new domain url please help me how can i remove my old post url's from web and how i publish new??and 1 thing more i am using webmaster tools and analystics ,and i am going to add my url in webmasters and, analystics and feed burner is this is a right way or i have to stay with my old url webmaster tools and analytics data??please reply me soon i am waiting

I will be purchasing my custom domain my blogger url now is modernbeauty21.blogspot.com and I want to change it to styleseekersguide,com. Will I lose any of my old followers and will they be able to read my posts and will the new url redirect them to my blog?

Thanks for following up to my question last night in the blogger forum (drays1998). After reading this post, I have noticed that my traffic is slowly (very slowly) making it's way back up. You've got a ton of great advice throughout your blog. I'm glad to be a new follower.

Thanks, very useful post. I've purchased the name of my blog 'ours-funarena' as a custom domain just a week back. So, basically it changes from 'ours-funarena.blogspot.com' to 'ours-funarena.com'. Traffic is not affected much. But my pagerank of 2 has come down to zero yesterday. Should I worry about it?

Great post Chuck, thanks for that. I'm wondering if you can help me. I tried to change a blogger post URL to increase SEO for a particular term, but now the original blogger URL doesn't work. How do I restore again? When I import the original blog post, a number is appended to the URL.

Original URL with link juice http://www.tweet2eat.co.nz/2011/04/opera-kitchen-cafe-hastings.html

As always, really helpful post and i'm still having to read all your links in it - but question. I'm confused about google analytics vs webmaster tools when moving to a custom domain. when i set mine up at my blogspot address under webmaster, all was fine, but then i started using analytics. to link them, i always end up with a msg that one (either the .org or the blogspot) is no longer associated with my webmaster (or analytics) acct. I can't them to be associated simultaneously. should I care? and if not, which should i use, ie should i use the code for my blogspot acct in webmaster pasted into my header code, or should i have the code from the .org account?

thanks very much. very confusing and any answer would be very much appreciated.ruth.www.yeshivathamekubalim.org

Thank you very much for this much needed blogpost. I have moved from amandawilliamsoncounselling.blogspot.com to amandawilliamsoncounselling.co.uk and have seen a huge drop in traffic all of a sudden, 5 days later. I'd better get posting :-/

I'm glad that I found you! I just change the url on my blog, and I'm freaking out about all the things that are happening right now... At least after reading your post I can understand the process! you just gain a new reader.

Very interesting and informative post. Thanks for helping those, who want knowledge on this Topic.Two weeks ago I changed the domain for my weight Loss Plan Blog and after two days all of sudden there was no traffic at all. And then no keywords were appearing. Today only few visits and hope for after reading your post that it will be fine. Please can you suggest anything, which I can do to bring my lost traffic back?

Hi Chucks, thanks for the other time. I have another problem that I feel you can help out. Recently I made a pictorial post on the richest people in Nigeria. How do I make the pictures fill the entire post body. Is there any tweak to use in the template source code. I'm on blogger.

Thanks for the question. Pictures are a very intense subject. You will find out, when you follow my suggestion - which is that you start a discussion in Blogger Help Forum: Get Help with an Issue, so your problem can be properly diagnosed.

Thanks for the question. Pictures are a very intense subject. You will find out, when you follow my suggestion - which is that you start a discussion in Blogger Help Forum: Get Help with an Issue, so your problem can be properly diagnosed.

I am having the worst experience after adding custom domain to my previous "blogspot.com" website: AppFixNTips. It's been two months since I added the custom domain and now I have lost 80% of my traffic. I think people should be warned about adding custom domain by blogger itself because adding a custom domain will result it a huge loss of search engine traffic. Older websites have high website authority, good search engine rankings and a lot of backlinks. When you change your old blogspot domain name, you are going to lose those backlinks. Yes "301 redirects" will redirect all the backlinks to your new domain but you won't get the same amount of link juice and that will affect your search engine rankings.

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One popular Stats related accessory, which displays pageview information to the public, is the "Popular Posts" gadget.

Popular Posts identifies from 1 to 10 of the most popular posts in the blog, by comparing Stats pageview counts. Optional parts of the display of each post are a snippet of text, and an ever popular thumbnail photo.

Like many Stats features, blog owners have found imaginative uses for "Popular Posts" - and overlook the limitations of the gadget. Both the dynamic nature of Stats, and the timing of the various pageview count recalculations, create confusion, when Popular Posts is examined.

We see the plea for help, periodicallyI need the URL of my blog, so I can give it to my friends. Help!Who's buried in Grant's Tomb, after all?No Chuck, be polite.OK, OK. The title of this blog is "The Real Blogger Status", and the title of this post is "What's The URL Of My Blog?".